desire?_" Aristide waved him away absently. Yes, it was some mistake.
Mrs. Errington in her agitation must have used the wrong cheque book.
But even rich English people do not carry about with them a circulating
library assortment of cheque books. It was incomprehensible--and
meanwhile, his thousand pounds....

The little square blazed before him in the August sunshine. Opposite
flashed the white mass of the Etablissement des Bains. There was the old
Roman Arch of Titus, gray and venerable. There were the trees of the
gardens in riotous greenery. There on the right marking the hour of
eleven on its black face was the clock of the Comptoir National. It was
Aix; familiar Aix; not a land of dreams. And there coming rapidly across
from the Comptoir National was the well knit figure of the young man
from Atlanta.

"_Nom de Dieu_," murmured Aristide. "_Nom de Dieu de nom de Dieu!_"

Eugene Miller, in a fine frenzy, threw himself into a chair beside
Aristide.

"See here. Can you understand this?"

He thrust into his hand a pink strip of paper. It was a cheque for a
hundred pounds, made payable to Eugene Miller, Esquire, signed by Mary
Errington, and marked "Not known. No account."

"_Tonnerre de Dieu!_" cried Aristide. "How did you get this?"

"How did I get it? I cashed it for her--the day she went away. She said
urgent affairs summoned her from Aix--no time to wire for funds--wanted
to pay her hotel bill--and she gave me the address of her old English
home in Somerset and invited me to come there in September. Fifteenth of
September. Said that you were coming. And now I've got a bum cheque. I
guess I can't wander about this country alone. I need blinkers and
harness and a man with a whip."

He went on indignantly. Aristide composed his face into an expression of
parental interest; but within him there was shivering and sickening
upheaval. He saw it all, the whole mocking drama....

He, Aristide Pujol, was the most sweetly, the most completely swindled
man in France.

The Comte de Lussigny, the mild Mrs. Errington and the beautiful Betty
were in league together and had exquisitely plotted. They had conspired,
as soon as he had accused the Count of cheating. The rascal must have
gone straight to them from Miller's room. No wonder that Lussigny, when
insulted at the tables, had sat like a tame rabbit and had sought him in
the garden. No wonder he had accepted the accusation of adventurer. No
wonder he had refused to